A recent article in the Washington Post states that Rep. Paul Ryan (R-Wis.), chairman of the House Budget Committee, has published a critical report of the federal government’s anti-poverty policies. This report, which has been released in advance of the unveiling of the GOP budget, recommends a sweeping overhaul of programs that have been in place for the last 50 years, including Head Start and Medicaid. It comes on the heals of the passing of the federal health-care law and the Democrat Party’s renewed focus on making income equality part of their 2014 platform. Rep. Ryan reports that the federal anti-poverty programs need to be entirely re-vamped. He also states that poverty is a result of broken families.

Paul Ryan is a Libertarian, a conservative party which believes that there is too much central government. When he says he wants to “re-imagine” federal policies, I imagine he intends to do away with those policies. To abolish programs such as Head Start or Medicaid would be tragic. We can’t blame poverty on broken families. We can blame poverty on poor education and poor healthcare.